tar

Tar

The tar command is a powerful tool used to create and manage archives of files on Linux systems. It stands for Tape Archive, but it’s not limited to archiving data to tape media anymore. With tar, you can package multiple files into one single file, compress them, and even extract archives from various formats.

Use Cases:

• Backing up important data by creating a single archive of multiple files.
• Distributing software packages that include many files.
• Compressing files to reduce storage space usage.

Syntax and Options:

You can use tar with several options, such as:

*   `tar -cvf archive.tar file1.txt`: Create an archive named "archive.tar" including the contents of file "file1.txt".
*   `tar -xvf archive.tar`: Extract the contents of an existing archive named "archive.tar".

Special Hacks and Tips:

• Compression: You can use tar with gzip or bzip2 compression options to create archives that are more space-efficient. For example, tar -cvzf archive.tar.gz file1.txt creates a compressed archive.
• Wildcard Characters: Use wildcards (*) in the file list to include multiple files at once, like tar -cvf archive.tar *.txt.
• Pipe tar with gzip: You can pipe tar output directly into gzip for compression, making it easier to create compressed archives on-the-fly. For example, tar -c -f - . | gzip > archive.tar.gz creates a compressed archive of the current directory.
• Multithreading (with GNU Tar): If you’re using GNU Tar (usually installed as „gztar“ or „tar“), you can use the -j option to enable multithreading, which significantly speeds up compression and archiving. For example, tar -cjvf archive.tar.bz2 file1.txt.

This command is essential for users who need to manage archives of files, compress data, and distribute software packages.

Necessary Level of Experience: Intermediate (3/5)